Gunsmiths of Darra

Darra Adam Khel is a town located 42km south of Peshawar, in Pakistans North West Frontier Province. In an area known as the Tribal Areas, which lie at the border to Afghanistan, Pakistani laws make way for tribal laws, in which Pakistani authorities have no power of jurisdiction. Drug and weapons trade are some of the biggest businesses in these areas.

Over the last century this homegrown armaments factory has produced a wide variety of weapons, including AK47s, M-16 rifles, simple handguns and shotguns. With the use of simple hand tools, files, hammers and small drill presses, elsewhere produced arms are copied to the highest quality. American, Soviet and Chinese weapons are the most commonly seen and sold in the showrooms lining the main street.

The gunsmiths in Darra can duplicate brand new weapons they haven’t seen before within 10 days. Any follow-up weapon, given the sheet-metal templates defining size and shape of every part, takes two to three days to manufacture. Bullets are sorted and produced here as well, and every few seconds it is possible to hear the weapons being tested in the hills surrounding the town.

Approximately 400 to 700 weapons are produced by the gunsmiths in their closet-sized rooms every day. They are sold to different landlords and tribes in Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province and Baluchistan, but a lot of the material goes directly over the border into Afghanistan supporting the Taliban regime and its insurgency against the western allies. Border patrols are barely visible in these areas, allowing the smuggling of weapons to proceed unchecked.

Since Darra Adam Khel does see tourists every once in a while, and the Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation still describes it as a point of interest in its brochures. Darra security personnel give foreigners brief tours upon arrival, with the possibility to test and purchase weapons, often selling popular “Pen Guns”. They stop foreign visitors from venturing further into the tribal areas, in which there are towns that produce heavy armaments, like rocket launchers and anti-aircraft missiles.